The True Story of a Hollywood Ingenue
by The Masked Writer1
Summary: So, apparently we were "lacking" in Beyond The Valley of the Dolls "fanfictions".
1. Chapter 1

**Ok, so a couple of years ago I serendipitously wrote a fanfiction as an English assignment- only it wasn't a fanfiction. This is just, to be honest, a verbatim retelling of "Beyond The Valley of The Dolls" with some elements from "Supervixens". Again, this was written a while ago (like everything else I've posted here). I honestly have to be so self-deprecating about this though...this was rushed as far as I remember. Again, I apologize for it being simply a verbatim retelling of the film- which in retrospect...hmm, never mind. **Honestly, this is probably just a POV take on the film.. **Also, I had some "run-ins" with the actors- please don't tell them I'm here. Again, this was never intended to be a fanfiction. Thanks, I guess, Roger Ebert...? Sorry? Um? Those lines were clever? **

I had probably been far too excited, I could feel my pulse leaping with each breath I inhaled, a strange booming sensation in my ears as if I was underwater, and the warmth of humid mid-summer air mingled with the scent of tobacco, sweat, and cologne. It all began with a simple statement and a charming pretense, words spoken amidst the fervor and sultriness of an open-air gathering, which actually wasn't being held in the open-air but had that quality about it, as the structure of the house it was being held in made it atmospherically so, "Here, have some grass, your Auntie won't see." His voice was fluid and mesmerizing and his eyes were gazing upon me curiously and cautiously, as if he was observing my movements and gestures pointedly and drawing his own conclusions from them. I felt oddly like an insect on a display case being observed. His eyes were narrow-tipped and slightly angular, but remarkably large and of a vibrant green shade, with an Asiatic quality about them. There was something profoundly sexual about his contemplative inspection, yet remarkably asexual as well. Like desire without the effort of being desirable. I wondered vaguely if he himself had accepted his own offer, but the lucidity of his scrutiny and the energy that I could see placidly residing within his powerful, well-built frame spoke otherwise. It's hard to imagine people like that being stoned. Or else, when they are stoned they become easy-going and flaccid, not cold and out of touch like some people. The kind of people you would want to take drugs with.

Naturally, I felt obliged, but instead, I blushed, and responded, "You know grass is considered kind of square these days," my eyes falling downward as I considered the truthfulness of my statement, which he countered by laughing pleasantly and saying "Depends on how you use it."

At the time, I wasn't exactly sure what he meant by those words, although I would find out soon enough.

We were walking together placidly amidst the crowd. How or why he chose me amongst all the pretty girls, I did not dare guess; his self-assured, cat-like grace was thrilling me along, and I was looking at the back of his head, feeling his fingers intertwined with mine, roused by the belief that I had somehow been "chosen".

"Just vodka would be nice," I admitted ruthfully.

"Or cognac."

"Groovy," he said. Why? He was still hastening me along, and I wished we could pause for a brief moment, though I suspected he was the kind of man who liked wild, exciting individuals; perusing the crowd like a barracuda was only a way of life to a philandering Lothario.

He likes parties, I thought. He likes being the harlequin, the MC amidst all the freaks he invites. Juice freaks and pill freaks…Stimulants, depressants, and hallucinogens…A rainbow of options to choose from.

Cold urgency, hands warm and inviting, pointing, guiding. Tightly directing. Not used to such experiences I felt my body quiver and my chest contract. It was all happening too fast. Childish mistrust leaped within me. Bodies ever so close, reeling and pawing. Freaks. Titillating. Screwing with fate. I began to shudder with concupiscence.

"I think you need that vodka. Shall I lead an expedition to the bar?"

I nodded as he placed me down upon a stool and as he sat there to renew his observation of me he asked his barman to prepare me a drink. The music being played was loud and vaguely irritating, though normally I wouldn't have minded it, or would have even enjoyed it. Narcotics never appealed to me, the sluggish mind that emerges from their embrace, the fuzzy distinctions between consent and non-consent, it was all madly uninviting to me, and now it felt as if the air was brimming with heady opiates. I wouldn't be surprised if I observed someone smoking a hookah, as I already knew they were kept and utilized here. I looked toward the band. I bitterly ascertained, sipping the alcohol, that they were probably stoned themselves. I reflected on this observation momentarily. I looked toward my companion once more; he was still leering at me. I was mildly surprised that he was not already in conversation with someone else, was I really so compelling that I, the lamb, had humbled the lion? Did he really want to go to bed with me?

I scrutinized and reflected, and thought men like that, they're more feminine than masculine, they don't let on their desires, they just inhale the tumult and accommodate, granting the given moment its hedonistic indulgence. Sex wasn't an option or a consideration for them: it was a state of mind. It held no meaning for them. It was just a biological epicureanism. An epicurean I thought, that's what he is. Like a connoisseur of fine wines, he is a connoisseur of all other tainted joys, and never throws himself too jubilantly into the frenzy of his unchecked passions.

I somehow felt as if it wasn't enough to refuse what I deemed his exorbitant offers, I had to get away somehow, but his hand was firmly placed on my wrist and I couldn't escape, all I could do was smile and look upwards at him. I had to admit, he was a remarkably attractive man; tall, of good proportions, with broad shoulders, and a slender waist encased in one of those slim-fitting suits that had been recently popularized, a colourful cravat tied jauntily around his neck. And young, older than me, certainly, but in his early 20s to be sure, and it was that youth that was eye-catching. He was a professional: successful, appealing, and well-endowed, wealthy, alluring and vigorous; omnipotent for a girl such as me; capable and glamorous, but above all, it was his youth that was the most commanding, because men such as him were not supposed to be young, attractive. "Is this Hollywood?" I asked myself. I never imagined I would run into such luck.

He was leading me somewhere, his eyes toying, and his iron grip pulling me unwillingly along, his words rushed and heated. I was pleased, yet slightly unnerved, and above all excited, experiencing what might have been called a "contact high". I felt my skin burn when he opened a door leading into a bedroom, only he didn't stop walking, he only continued, hastily jerking me along through some more entrances where occasionally we might meet a couple, sitting or chatting, always in an undeniably provocative way, but never involved in anything too risqué. I wondered what he thought about the antics of those men and women capering through his house looking for a private room to "have a conversation in". In fact, he seemed to be proud of it, judging by the sheen in his eyes, which only glowed more strongly as we met two men in a compromising situation; something which was rapidly corrected when we entered their presence.

"What is this, a studio tour?" one of them growled, as the other righted himself and flirtatiously straightened his waistcoat before gamboling out of the room, followed by what I assumed to be his bedmate, a look of bloody murder in his eyes.

I attempted a smile, and my companion's eyes wandered over my frame lasciviously, as I considered the warped nature of fate. Confused and ashamed, I slunk towards the luxurious ends of the room, observing the scene before me of oddly structured medieval furnishings combined with a modern four-poster bed as well as a great deal of drapery and furs of tiger and leopard.

"Can you dig it?" he asked.

"Yeah, it's real nice, man. I've always wanted a room like this."

He stepped toward me in what might have been interpreted as an offensive way, his shoulders rippling.

"Over here," he motioned, grasping me again, as we entered into a similarly luxurious poorly-lit cave of ferns and off-white furnishings. It contained within it a monstrous tub encroached upon by massive hunks of varying grades of unpolished granite and sandstone, adorned by mock gold vessels probably containing oils for bathing. This environment, this behavior, it was all so bizarre and deviant for me, as if I was a blind peasant being lead through all the levels of Dante's sinful inferno of pleasure, and I was only in the First Circle, toeing the line of the Second. I suppose that was the only way to describe my situation, wandering through a terrible, wonderful hell.

"Class," I interjected.

"The idea came to me one evening in a vision."

I wanted to ask him what kind of vision this had been, how exactly he had received it, and how I too could be blessed with such mesmerizing all-seeing episodes, but then I thought better of it.

I realized in this moment, how very lost I was. I was lost in this "inferno", and I couldn't navigate out of it. I suddenly felt intensely dizzy; the heat in these rooms was stifling, even outside the humidity was crushing and there seemed to be no relief. I was used to constant fresh air and breezes, and this house, this gathering, and its intense depravity meant I was spiraling deeper and deeper into the underworld, leaving me shamefully unrestrained.

"Are you alright? You look a tad ill." His voice was flat, concerned, but flat. That's all I could remember of his tone.

I leaned over scandalously close to him, until his cologne shot up my nose, my head pounding. I felt him place his hands on my shoulders and view me, a dash oppressively, while I attempted to steady myself.

"I just feel a little dizzy. It's the heat is all, it sometimes makes me headachy."

I looked up, attempting to appear a smidgen more light-hearted; I had no intention of appearing priggish before a free-wheeling libertine.

"That's alright, I really feel fine." While attempting to not make my smile look in any way strained, it may have appeared as being somewhat benumbed in the process, a little too euphoric, a little too high, a little too blissful. I placed my hand on his upper arm and simpered tenderly some words which I couldn't recall after having said. While I wasn't actually narcotized, I was tired. It was late, and I was not used to such high-flying society affairs.

He led me out of the room, holding me in a way I wished I could interpret as having been tender and gracious, gentleman-like even, as I clutched him desperately, a mixture of emasculated lust and moderate distress flowing through my veins. I sighed with respite as I gulped in the cooler whiffs or air flowing in from the ocean. A breath of wind had picked up, and now, the sweet, salty smell of the sea had erased all memories of pungent debauchery from my distraught mind. It turned out we weren't actually as far from the main sitting area as I thought; it appeared that with our constant movement and what had seemed to me to be vacillating, mercurial wanderings, we had actually come full circle and arrived back where we had started.

He was holding me by the hands now, pressing his back against a wall and looking at me with a new intensity, his eyes slit-like as he questioned me. "A new test?" I thought to myself uneasily, at the same time aroused by how tightly he was holding me to him.

"So, you're into a heavy scene, aren't you? Don't sweat it; it can be a drag…"

With those words, I began to contemplate how far I had really fallen in the short time I had spent here. I wasn't a bad person, I told myself, I never really fell, I had just been pushed. I could just as easily float angelically upward again. I was simply too easily and too unwittingly influenced by all those around me, unwittingly, but with some degree of internal realization and resignation.

I vaguely remembered what something or someone had told me about Hollywood, "Perverts and fruits..." the rest escaped me.

I realized I was staring at his lips; they were moving, but it was almost as if I had checked out, and was no longer listening to the words coming from his mouth. His lips and his eyes, which were moving in a cultivated continuum were dominating me benignly yet unscrupulously, so that it was not clear to me what possible control I had over the situation. Could he be offering me something, some form of allowance, some opportunity that I was not fully grasping?

Suddenly, I jumped up and down eagerly against him, to his surprise, something made evident by the slow, salacious grin, filling up the entirety of his face, only rivaled by the brilliant vibrancy and ebullience in his eyes, which were boring into me relentlessly. I wondered briefly, how did that change come upon him, the change necessary to produce such an air of delight? Does he practice to achieve that expression of counterfeit astonishment? I couldn't help feeling foolish as I let my arm fall down his neck, reveling in the feeling of his silky strands of hair between my fingers. He was treating me remarkably seriously, and I halted, considering the significance of those actions, but at the same time I was bewildered. I reminded myself that he was young…and the chilling combination of youth and experience was intoxicating to me. I tried to remind myself of all the boys I had known, he could have been one of them, I tried to tell myself- but it was impossible, it was like attempting to convince myself that a Roman Emperor could live among his slaves or a god among mortals. My thoughts were becoming increasingly distracted and wanton, and it was becoming challenging to resist. What there even was to resist seemed to me increasingly groundless and practically hallucinatory. I could no longer recall if I had taken any drugs or not. Did I really become one of those naïve, sensual creatures when stoned? My behavior was already starting to alarm me, at this point I was on the verge of fondling, and I didn't have the audacity to look my partner in the face.

I let my arm drop limply over his shoulder, as I heard the chords to a new song being played ring out over the crowded gathering. I looked upward to see inquisitive eyes, lips slightly parted in cool rapture.

"_I left home when I was only seventeen, met a guy, he and I dropped down to New Orleans,"_

Well-shaped, I thought admiringly once more, as he stepped nearer. From somewhere I heard in my mind, "-the bedroom eyes, the firm, young body; these are the tools with which he plies his trade, all are available for a price."

"_He seemed to know his way around and I thought I could land a sweet talking old C-C-Candy Man,"_

I felt the ludicrousness of the entire situation bearing down upon me, felt my sins and the sweat upon my brow, and did not know how to ensnare it, how to treat it, how even to capitalize upon it. I simply felt limp as a rag doll.

"_On his bed, kept him fed, and oh, I loved him so, but I got to cry aloud whenever he would go,"_

For some reason, in my distorted, delusional mind I began to think of Catherine the Great, and of the many lovers she kept; some dumb and beautiful, others intelligent and witty, others powerful and well-equipped to manage her royal affairs. Stallion-in-chief. Emperor of the Night.

"_I guess I was just too young to really understand, a sweet talking old C-C-Candy Man"_

Velvet. I hadn't realized his suit was velvet until now. I hated the texture of velvet, but that didn't mean I didn't wear it myself anyway.

He was playing with my hair, lips still slightly parted.

"Do you have any other suits?" He laughed uproariously: "Oh, lots!"

"And cravats too?" "Oh, sure! You want to play dress-up?"

It was all so juvenile, rings and pomades and shirts and pants…

I suppose I kept forgetting that he was rich.

But, if he was rich, then, why…?

My mind was in relentless turmoil. I could not comprehend the actions being presented before me and their implications.

"_And played around and brought me down, and finally threw me out. I got burned, but I learned what life was all about,"_

I felt sick. What was life about? Pants and pomades and neckties I could bet. And money. Why was I all of a sudden thinking about money?

I looked again at him, desperately, almost lovingly, my teeth grinding against each other; a strange sensation of tenderness was coursing through me, a strange feeling of pathetic ardor mingled with acceptance.

I realized that as little as I cared for drugs and alcohol, I cared very much for being rich and being loved, in whichever order they came in.

That slow fire of ecstasy welling up inside of me was making me dizzy again and I had to lean against him once more for support. Flesh, sweat, desire; rings, cravats, and colognes. _Falling_. Money. Lust. _Lust. _Lust for…

"_And I often think of him, every now and then, that sweet talking old Candy Man."_


	2. Chapter 2

Those lazy eyes were caressing me, sitting upon a languid grin.

People like that either like music a lot, or the money it makes them, because it was the only real thing I had seen so far that had made him truly smile. That made me happy. I felt I needed him, not only to suckle off of but to set me free. I had chosen my path, and I would no longer be judged. I was happy. I was already free. If only to keep my loved one smiling, I would be pleasing and good. He was good to me, just as long as I did what he wanted, he would be good to me, heavenly and ravishing. Just as long as he kept smiling at me…loving me…

"_The sweet smell of clover won't make the world over,"_

He liked me because I made him money, so I looked upon him and his lazy eyes and believed that they spelled out love for me. He reacted to the music oddly, though, as if it were an aphrodisiac, becoming increasingly heated and lustful, submitting his body to the "ritual" as he called it. It was unnerving but he did his work well, and people loved him for it. I loved him for it.

"_You spend all your hours talking to flowers, who won't even talk back to you,"_

Of course, he was wearing a new ensemble; he had one for every day of the year. He had those new suits and cravats I had dreamed of. There was something sexual about his connection with the music, something I wanted, but was unable to profit from. I simply composed myself and gave my best attempt to submit myself to whatever rapaciousness took over my "lover" when he was enamored. Not with me, of course. I kept my head down, non-threateningly.

He coached me, "Just, please, keep smiling at me, darling…like you mean it. You're too morose. That's it. Relax. You have to keep a good public persona. Look at me, now, in the eyes. Like you mean it. Be serious, it bodes nothing unless you're serious."

What a strange thing to say, relax, yet be serious at the same time. I suppose that's why I loved him, because he was and forever would be a series of contradictions to me; relaxed yet ready to pounce, svelte as a leopard pacing in his cage. Bringing me to a degree of positive lecherous heaven and then attempting to cool my sentiments with well-placed reprisals. "Be serious, it bodes nothing unless you're serious," he is lost amidst his fancies and divinations, I thought, he is not really hear, he is in his own world. "Come back, I can't find you when you're there!" I wanted to call out.

So I kept looking at him, locking eyes with him, and feeling like he was seeing something in me, in the music that never actually existed, that he had taken a fragment of my soul and grafted it into his own, that I was somehow a part of him now. That he was using a part of me to physically manifest whatever it was that he truly loved and desired. With a vague terror I realized he was using me, milking me for my substance.

An intensity that I had not seen before entered into his gaze and I faltered, upset by this new magnitude of emotion that accosted my helpless forms. At the same time, his eyes were telling me not to falter, no to stumble, so I soldiered on. Anything to please my love. I had to keep being lovely for him.

"And that's a wrap,"

I went up to him immediately afterwards, hoping to bask in his star quality and hopefully feed off of it like a sponge.

"You've done it again, darling. Mistress fair…Mescaline Madonna…My supple countess…Splendorous…"

He was talking to me, saying something about being majestic, breathing heavily, pupils and nostrils dilated with excitement, only I wasn't listening. Why, when I only saw his face everywhere I went? Eyelashes fluttering, lips, voice…Kisses bestowed like favors.

It was all so well-rehearsed. Beautiful, but dead. Poetry without rhythm. Translated from some foreign tongue, now thrust upon my ear.

"I'm having a party tonight, babe, to celebrate our success." His face is thrust into mine and his voice is breathy and heavy. I expect to smell alcohol but there is none. Eyes wide, pupils dilated. Lips moist.

That should have set me aflame "our", I smiled indifferently, "Sure thing, I've got a change of clothing with me."

His eyes cooled all of a sudden, and I felt the desire to embrace him and tell him that I loved him, really loved him, not Hollywood-style loved him, but didn't. Not only loved him because he was my manager and I was infatuated with him, my heart trapped and fluttering like a baby bird. I felt myself flushing red.

"We'll be heading to Studio 54 afterwards."

"Why? Your house is Studio 54."

Laughter.

Other individuals appear and we strike up conversation. I unwillingly, unabashedly. More freaks. How I am tired of freaks, of pretense. I remind myself how many friends he has. I wonder vaguely where the money flows from. Do they all drink from the same spring? All beautiful people throwing themselves at each other. I remember my earlier observations of fruits and practically snicker as I reflect on the truthfulness of the statement. Here we are holed up with each other, stifled by a chemical bomb of pheromones and anodynes, uncertainly holding on for dear life.

I changed quickly and returned to his hands about my waist. More laughter. Strong cologne. Aftershave. Jostling bodies. Then we're in his limousine and drinking cognac and cocktails being handed out like peanuts, and we're all delirious with elation, flying somewhere high amongst the clouds. The time I notice, is 10:30. The chatter is raucous and I hardly notice when we arrive at his mansion, and I am whisked inside with the rest of the party.

He calls for a toast when we arrive. He's visibly tipsy. His hair is disheveled and he's swaying ever so slightly, but I've seen him recover from worse. I wondered, does he practice to get his hip to pop out like so? But, I ought to know now, with him, everything is a fragment of a memory, each word he speaks has been stolen from someone else- Hemingway, Shakespeare, only lifted conspicuously to suit a mood or a need. Now he'll sit around and talk and drink cleverly some more, his mind on other things. Standing around with wickedness in his eyes, the ever mercurial MC, while everyone else gets laid.

We were sitting together on the divan when he reached over and began to fondle me, all while keeping an extraordinarily impassive expression on his face. I was drunk, so I didn't move, didn't falter. I suppose I kept a similarly impassive expression.

A friend I didn't know who was probably stoned looked prepared to leave when he was berated unassertively, "Where you going, man?" an intoxicated beam added to the repertoire of lechery.

Meanwhile I lay in my manager's arms nursing a gin and tonic somewhat ineffectually, because I was lying in an uncomfortable, cramped position; my body wedged and doubled over on the far side of the couch, in a position that did not lend itself well to fashionably consuming alcohol.

The absurdity of the situation and the raw fondling was enough to make me begin to giggle and that giggle fermented into a laugh and so after attempting to raise myself I collapsed on the divan spilling my drink on me so that I was left wet.

"Oh, goodness," I cried out remorsefully, "How do I look?"

He looked over at me libidinously and my heart sank slightly with embarrassment as I regretted my choice of clothing for the evening, "Dynamite, baby—" Moving lewdly closer and nodding his head intensely, eyes widening "Dynamite."

He wasn't even touching me now, just beaming, with the man beside him wobbling and attempting to insert himself into the encounter.

"You know, the funniest thing happened to me last week…" I began.

"Oh yeah, babe?"

"Well, remember the party you hosted, the one where the fight started between that gigolo and the taxi driver?"

"Oh sure, wow, that was thrilling."

"Anyway, you know that girl, Ivy Lake, the fashion model? Well, that night the poor girl was so stoned she couldn't see left from right so I took her over to my place to the spend the night…"

"Oh yeah?"

"And when we arrived I noticed that her brassiere was stuffed with what I assumed to be low-quality pot."

"No surprise there!"

"She offered me some, so naturally, I obliged, but you wouldn't even believe it! I started to light up, when I realized it wasn't in fact pot after all, it was only oregano! I thought, of course, she must have really been stoned to think that we could get an oregano high…"

Raucous laughter.

"So then what?"

"Then, she stared at me wildly, and so I realized that she was not actually stoned at all, in fact she told me she had to get away from the party because the drummer from Strawberry Alarm Clock was actually her half-brother out for revenge since she had accidentally given her stepmother a fatal overdose of quinine when she was ten. That he was out to get her with a meat axe and he had already threatened her when she was doing a shoot in Cincinnati two years ago, and since then she had been on the run from him and could I please hide her out in my house for a couple of weeks 'till she could get her act together."

My partners observed me with wide-eyed astonishment.

"At this point, I thought to myself, she's not stoned but she is tripping out!" I paused breathlessly for a moment. "So, I told her that I would let her stay but that in the morning I would call the police about it, only she then grabbed me violently and told me not to, so I simply said that I knew somebody in the next state over who could hole her up where Meat Axe Drummer would never find her. Of course, she thanked me a million times over and then passed out in the kitchen."

"What a charming story."

I was going to add the bit about waking up to the girl's hallucinatory ravings about her Meat Axe brother at two in the morning, but was too muddled or disconcerted to make the effort.

'What a girl you've got there," interjected the depressed stoner, who had appeared to be shooting up beside us when he thought we weren't looking.

"Can you beat that?" my associate shared a guffaw with the other stranger before squeezing me tightly and unpleasantly.

"Oh, and she's just getting started-! Aren't you?" Those hands began to run over my body again possessively and intrusively, "I bet you've got loads of other stories you could share, right, babe?" He was laughing, grinning, eyes glimmering. "Show us what else you can do, honey!"

"Here!"

Suddenly, he grabbed the hand of the other man and shoved it up my dress to my absolute shock and despair. He then took the man's other hand and drew it towards my breast. "Here, feel that."

In no other possible way could my humiliation have been made any more complete then through this demeaning treatment, made worse by the combination of the glassy-eyed, astounded look in the stranger's eyes as he was forced to fondle my body and the blissed out, belittling gaze of my befuddled counterpart. What disgusted me the most was that I still could have kissed him even now, to prove my utter, unfailing devotion.

"Can you handle it?" he was weak with sobs of mirth, arousal provoking a tumult of words.

"Come on babe, do something nice for a friend of mine," he began to touch my hand and guide it towards some unspeakable place. My body tensed with bewilderment and consternation at the realization of what I was being made to do to a complete stranger. I began to cry inwardly, as I reflected to myself that the harlequin, the ever mercurial MC never left the party. He would glance away at intervals, as if in some sick way offering us some privacy.

The stoner looked upward uneasily, "I appreciate the hospitality, but I really must be going now…" I wondered, had he even been invited, or had he just dropped in with another rag tag group of junkies looking for their next hit at some unidentified L.A mansion that was known far and around to hobos as a place where weed was grown in the potted plants?

"Hey, pilgrim, who are you, rejecting my baby like that, hey?" the look given was agitated, comical even, ever so slightly threatening. Meanwhile, I too, looked desperately upward; reeling from the hell of grinding and groping I was being incarcerated in.

"Man, I gotta cut out," the hobo lurched off of me to my relief and to my partner's dolor as I lay, my body trembling unreasonably in the same ungraceful position as before.

I looked toward him, to see him nodding towards the distressed varlet, newly sipping what I assumed to be vodka, as a cold iciness overcame my body, in such a way that I somehow huddled back against him for warmth and comfort. Kissing the hand that slapped me. Then I refreshed my thoughts. Perhaps, on the other hand, I was in fact, biting the hand that fed me. I began to softly cry onto his shoulder.

He looked at me with an air of disgust, and pushed me off of him, as if my tears were like acid, "You know me better than that, babe. I told you what to do, and you couldn't even listen to and follow my instructions. You forget that I'm your manager, and you're supposed to follow through on whatever demands I make of you. You belong to my company. I, in fact, own you. Anything that you are today is a result of my efforts. Whether you like it or not you belong to me now. Don't you ever forget that." His words were cruelly pointed and sharp, as was the directness and the intensity in his eyes. I cowered in the face of such a reprisal, which was spoken with such a degree of precision and forwardness that I felt I had just received a blow to the gut.

I thought to myself, everything he just said is true. He owns me completely. My mind, my soul, my heart. He knows that, and he takes advantage of the fact that without him I would be helpless and lost. Whatever I may mean to him, I am essentially his property to do what he desires with.

"Why, why?" I tugged his shoulder repeatedly, crying "Why did you make him…" referring to the stoner.

Suddenly, he alighted off the divan and approached the stoner, who only a few meters away, reveling in one last smoke before he headed on his way and would no longer be able to freeload off of other people.

My companion approached him callously, with a bit of swagger in his step as he made eye contact with him and grinned once more with that same degree of apathy.

"That was no way to treat my baby."

A quivering response as the man fingered the dried leaves between his thumbnails, "No offense intended, man."

"You weren't showing the proper respect for her, huh," he ascertained before throwing a vicious punch.

Even I was surprised by this sudden act of violence, thinking always that certain individuals would never resort to it, even in the direst of circumstances.

The stoner staggered from his knees to give a look of revulsion mingled with hatred before saying, "Now I'll let that pass, now if…" instead this was punctuated by another careening punch before the two men collapsed on the floor raining a hail of blows upon each other.

Meanwhile the other party-goers cried out with surprise while I attempted to determine, while in a state of alarm, whether or not I should help to protect my cruelly misused "virtue".

I ran up to the two to see them struggling on the parquet floor with first one getting the upper hand, then the other, surprising, considering they were both relatively doped, but yet fighting like boxers in a ring.

I had to admit, a strange conciliatory amusement and sense of well-being rose within me to see these two men fighting "over me" in such a way. It was only somewhat intriguing.

"Oh, oh," I intervened, trying to pull them off of each other, but only ended up in the heat of the altercation, vainly attempting to knee at least someone in the crotch.

Eventually my colleague appeared to pin the other man to the ground while I collected myself vainly beside him, my eyes wandering in tandem with his as he grabbed a collection of plastic bags hanging from the poor bastard's bedraggled shirtfront.

This inauspicious defender of my virtue punched the fellow once more, in such a way that it appeared as if he had broken his nose, adding, "And that's for stealing from my stash."

Crouching beside this savage animal, I felt like an accomplice in some reprehensible crime.

I thought to myself, "They're acting like a couple of drugs lords." And then, "Is this who I fell in love with, a drug lord who makes me have sex with other men for his own twisted satisfaction?"

Following this episode, I considered my best recourse was to leave, but somehow as the victor's conquest in this odd ordeal, I was unable to, and drinks and other goodies were handed all around, and the affair was soon forgotten, the loser having been already hauled out onto the driveway where he had probably passed out, or so I reasoned.

The rest of the evening and during the majority of the night my eyes remained in direct contact with the ground. Somehow, there was still room left for intimate dancing, and I unwillingly joined in. Everyone seemed to have forgotten the miserable fight and was having a fine time once more.

A few minutes later he who was known as my 'manager' disappeared while I joylessly wondered where he had spirited his guests away too. Instead of searching the expanse of the house, though, I went outside and reveled in the feeling of the sand of his private beach between my toes. I think, once more, I could live here and be happy.

I think to myself, I'll probably stay over. He usually doesn't mind when people do that. I'll crumple into one of the many beds and fall asleep like a baby and wake up wondering where the night went. He has a lovely beachside patio where I can enjoy some hangover schnapps while I recover in the early morning sunlight, all while surrounded by those who passed out on the beach, hoping for sex at 1am, but too stoned to provide it or receive it.

I chuckled to myself, as I realized, we're all stoned aren't we? We're all freaks here, aren't we? Snorting and smoking, inhaling merrily with not a care in the world but when we'll receive our next hit?

All of a sudden, an incredibly morbid mood came over me like a heavy cloud, as I considered my earlier humiliation with sickening horror. I could not ever forget that contemptuous, alienating grin of lust and the way it made me feel. Not ever.

All at once, the thought emerges before my eyes, "Kill him. Do him in. He's so stoned he'll never see it coming."

I shudder as I consider the possible implications of those kinds of thoughts in my distressed, medicated mind. How could I, I ask myself. He's far too strong, he'd surely overpower me. "Take him and choke him with his scarf when he's sleeping. Take one of those pistols he's got lying around and shoot him point blank. Unless you do him in right away, he'll kill you first. He's the kind of man that will kill to get what he wants."

I reentered the house, and wandered into a room ready to collapse onto the bed. I didn't know how long I had lain when I awoke to see him staring at me in the doorway, as he slowly closed the door behind him, an odd glow in his eyes.

"So without the boy wonder, my sylph-like friend," I was too dazed to comprehend the meaning of his words, though I imagined I undoubtedly could have if given a moment to analyze them.

Suddenly he swung me off my feet into his arms. My head was crushed against his chest and I heard the hard hammering of his heart beneath my ears. He hurt me and I cried out, muffled, frightened. He went into the utter darkness. He was a mad stranger and this was a black darkness I did not know, darker than death. He was like death, carrying me away in arms that hurt. While I was stifled against him he stopped suddenly and chuckled lazily, while I cowered in fear. I felt my body grow limp. I was wearing a short little number and for some reason feared it was too revealing now, in my prostrate position. Turning me swiftly in his arms, he bent over and kissed me before pushing me onto the bed with a savagery and a completeness that wiped out everything from my mind but the dark into which I was sinking and the lips on mine. I kept hearing his words reverberating in my mind, "Whether you like it or not, you belong to me now."

He's definitely stoned now, I thought. This is not how I imagined him to be stoned. He was one of those people you just couldn't imagine being stoned. Stoned off of what, though, I thought. Peyote? I'll bet he was hallucinating. I wondered how much I had drunk in the course of the evening, I didn't want to know.

I pushed him off of me. He looked at me haughtily as if I owed him something.

"Who are you to reject me like that?"

I whimpered, stifling a misplaced titter as I considered the irony of his words "What else will you make me do for bread?" my eyes filled with misplaced longing, my body sleek against his own which was warm and inviting with its bigness and its power over my own.

"Not love? Gold? Affection? Friendship?" his tones were rapturous and his breaths were heavy and I couldn't help but be seduced by them, as regrettably dazed as they were.

"I'm here, aren't I? Here in your bed." I motioned around me. "Doesn't that prove something, doesn't that satisfy you?" I wanted to say, "I'm all yours, what are you waiting for?"

"I accept your fealty, slave girl, and do nobly return it for the price of a kiss." He paused. "A kiss upon your…" He kissed me again, his lips supple and his tongue thrust outward, his palm caressing my bosom, and this time I put my arms around his neck, my fingers quivering, my skin jumping into goose bumps along my neck. Sometimes he spoke like that, oddly, like an old-fashioned knight.

He was shaking, as though he stood in a strong wind, and his lips, traveling from my mouth downward fell on my hot flesh as the both of us moaned and jerked against each other as if by reflex, as if it came as a surprise to both of us that we wanted to make love to each other.

"I need a drink." I was shaking too, like a dry leaf in a breeze.

I reached beside me to a bottle of vodka that was sitting on the bedside table, but he was holding me impressively and kissing me so that I couldn't grasp it. I thought eagerly about that drink while I was being kissed.

He stopped kissing me and looked at me again, this time a little diffidently and disappointedly, and he repeated something he had said to me earlier, "You must be serious, it bodes nothing unless you're serious, little nymph."

I wanted to say to him, "What is this, another episode of the histrionic, attention-seeking game you constantly play with the world?" I told myself the poor man must be deluded.

I looked at him desperately, I couldn't understand what in the world he was saying, and told myself he had to be hallucinating. I wondered when he could have possibly taken what he had taken. I cursed peyote for making every word nonsensical even in the most well-formed of mouths.

I replied, "Yes, I know, we're creatures treading the River Styx."

"And you're a moonchild."

He responded by smiling euphorically, I remembered I had seen him earlier smoking something, a glint in his eyes. Psychoactive.

"Why turn away? You know, you'll always come back." he said. At the time, I couldn't listen to his words rationally, if they were at all rational.

His hands were lying upon my body and I enjoyed the physical intimacy they offered. Above all, his touch was electric. I enjoyed the smell of his sweat and the closeness of our bodies and I craved that intimacy. I wanted to be held in strong arms and protected. My entire figure was limp as a rag doll and utterly immovable.

This was what reason, I knew, the world of the living, would condemn as a nightmare. But we no longer resided within the world of the living; we were indeed creatures treading the river Styx…

Suddenly, I wrapped my arms around him again and returned his kisses lovingly and intently, and so what followed was darkness, where nothing had existed before and nothing would ever exist at the time of and following this darkness, which I now recognized as lust. Lust for touches, embraces, kisses; alcohol, drugs, and sleaze. _Falling_. Love. Lust. _Lust. _Lust for…


	3. Chapter 3

I held the lab results placidly in my hands, resigning myself to the words on the paper that I had become well-acquainted with from the moment I had first read them some two hours ago.

One never really believed these things right away, never really comprehended them and consulted with others right away, but I knew I had to, if only to shake the cobwebs from my brain, the cold, unfeeling respite that came with forgetfulness, and so I made my way to Ivy's studio. Strangely, the only real friend I had made here was a woman who had been having hallucinations in my home.

I went up to her, amidst the hustle and bustle of the fashion studio and asked to speak her privately, since this was an urgent matter, "Ivy, I've got something to tell you." She looked towards me smilingly, she would probably always remember the kindness I had extended to her in her time of need, I thought wryly, perhaps she'll extend the same kindness to me now.

"What is it?" she asked, lighting a cigarette, a dry twinkle in her eyes.

"I'm pregnant."

She looked upon me, silently laughing "How far along?"

"Two months."

"Are you sure?" she questioned me, eyes slits, I suppose, one had to really know for sure in such matters.

"The lab report came in."

Her eyes glittered as she addressed me, "Wow, you've got one of the more common Hollywood problems! I know a doctor who helps women like you. Ssh, don't tell me who the father is, I already figured it out. Women like you, they're a dime a dozen; fucked by their exec then left in the lurch when their body starts to show it. You haven't told him yet, right? Good. Don't. He won't react well to the news. Men like that don't need babies. He'll drop you from the label the moment you use that word, and don't expect him to start paying you alimony when he does. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if he never wanted to see your face again. You're under contract remember? Don't tell me you haven't read the fine print! You're just a commodity to be taken and used and molded in the hands of an artist; when he tires of you or when the profit margin starts to sink, he'll sell and fast. When the well runs dry he'll cut his losses. He'll be gone before you know what hit you, onto the next big hit." She looked at me condescendingly.

"You want me to lose the baby?"

"What else is there? For God's sake it's the easiest option and the safest too, I'll say. Trust me, I know lots of girls who have had the procedure done, you'll be as good as new afterwards, and then when this is all over we can have a drink, just us girls, and laugh about how we really shafted him, the son of a bitch. For all the suffering he's caused you, I'd say it's a done deal."

I wanted to scream, but I could no longer formulate words, they simply refused to exist and materialize themselves upon my tongue.

"But, but," I stammered ineffectually searching for the right words to convey the depth of my emotions.

"But what, don't tell me you're one of those women that rejects abortions because they're unethical! Girl, all you've done is be unethical from the moment you arrived here! Don't give me that crap!"

"But, I want this baby."

"Tell me," she slunk closer to me "Tell me how it happened, and then I'll tell you something you don't know."

"It was at one of his parties," I whispered, "We were both stoned, I guess, it all happened so fast."

"The child of a man you never loved, conceived in a moment you don't even remember," she shook her head as if I was a silly child who had to be counseled in matters of life.

I wanted to scream "I do love him-! I always did!" but the words would not budge from my throat.

"And despite all that, you feel loyalty to a man who raped you when you were in a state of unconsciousness."

That same scream stuck in my throat as I looked towards the girl who was coaching me in affairs of the heart. The same girl who told me the drummer from Strawberry Alarm Clock was an axe murderer.

My whole body began to tremble with fear as I realized the truth in what she was telling me. The horrifying words shot me clean through the heart.

I could barely listen to those words being spoken and instead turned away, pretending not to hear when the syllables, in fact, rang clear in my head.

"It's only your problem," she whispered in my ear.

"He doesn't want it."

"Seven more months of agony, for what, a bastard that the father won't even acknowledge? Get real. Like I said, you're not the only one who this has happened too."

The rest of the conversation I could no longer remember until after we parted when my blood started to flow again.

She told me he didn't want me, he would no longer want me with a child. She spoke of heinous things men did in those situations and I felt tears fall down my cheeks, tears of pain, as I had hoped, only just hoped, only just nursed the slightest belief that if we had a child together, that he might love me, or at least learn to love me. At least he would love our child, and that would mean some form of conciliation between us. After all, the child is worth ten of the mother, right?

I clutched onto a wrought iron fencepost for support, before wretching miserably behind a stone palisade. My body was in a state of rejection; as if it was rejecting the baby I was carrying. Perhaps I would have a natural miscarriage, and then it would all be cleared up without any nastiness. I closed my eyes and breathed in deeply. I still wanted to tell him, tell him that I loved him, before it was too late. My tears fell onto the cold, unthinking pavement.

What could I possibly do without him, without us? I wondered, my body trembling. How could I live in this new miserable hell I had fallen into?

What to do? What to do?

I had to see him, had to tell him.

At this realization it was like chains fell away from my body, and I was running, suddenly running, because I realized I wasn't far from his house, and I could make it there in less than a half hour is I moved quickly.

"Darling!" I wanted to shout, "Darling! I'm coming back to you."

How I wanted it, the haven I had sought in dreams, the place of warm safety shrouded in mist, I ran ever faster, my heart pounding in my ears until I reached what I believed to be the seat of safety.

I entered through the back door, which was typically unlocked at this hour, and held my breath as I began searching for him, praying he would be here, so I could tell him, tell him the truth.

I found him in his plush, gaudy study, when I approached him from behind. He heard my footsteps, and so turned around to face me. It was as if he was expecting me, he approached me, removed my jacket, as I straightened my hair momentarily and gazed at him without feeling, without movement, my heart stilled.

I didn't know what to say to him, so I said instead, "I have come to beg you for forgiveness."

"I'm ashamed of all the troubles I've caused you. I should have been better to you," I added.

All of a sudden, a strange, nameless fury rose up within me, similar to what I experienced that night on the beach, only now my head was clear.

He looked upon me coldly, calculating what he thought my next move would be.

"I need money," I told him, "Twenty-five thousand." I thought is that enough to cut and run? In saying those exorbitant numbers, I could barely contain what was coming out of my mouth.

His eyes betrayed stupor. He turned away from me, "How soon?"

Suddenly, I thought, he really is going to give it to me, he really will be an honest gentleman about this.

"Immediately."

He wavered and chuckled as he stepped towards me once more, making eye contact before saying, "I don't have that kind of money."

My heart felt as if it had been torn out from my body as I couldn't believe I had just heard what I thought I heard.

I expelled a forced laugh, "You mean to tell me a man such as you, doesn't have a mere twenty-five thousand?" I placed my arms around him while he stared down upon me clinically.

Of course he had it, why was he lying to me? He just wouldn't give it to me- money like that represented pennies to men like him.

"I'm not used to giving out that much money at once."

"Twenty-five thousand here, twenty-five thousand there, what does it matter to you? Tell me how much that tailored suit cost, and I'll tell you what kind of man you are," tears stung in my eyes and I could no longer breathe.

"You must need it for something."

"I-I, I'm sick, I'm not well, I don't know if I'll be able to continue working from now on."

He gave me a bizarre introspective glance and said, "You're lying, unless you're only telling me a half-truth."

"How do you know?" I flashed him a similar look and thought, "Does he know?"

"Your eyes are too revealing. They tell me that what you just told me is not true."

I wanted to vomit again, to slump to his feet in a faint, but I couldn't, I had to be strong, like Ivy said. She had told me, "When this is all over, we can have a drink together, just us girls, and laugh about how we really shafted him, the son of a bitch."

"I think, perhaps you may be right. It may be time for the both of us to move on,"

"To what?" my blood had run as cold as ice in an instant. "No, no!" I grabbed him by the shoulders. Ivy was right, I realized; he knew, he was letting me go now, it was all coming true like she prophesized.

Incoherent for a moment, I cried, "Oh, you're all wrong! Terribly wrong!"

He put his hand under my chin, quietly turned my face up to the light and looked for an intent moment into my eyes. I looked up at him, my heart in my eyes, my lips tremulously attempting speech. But I could marshal no words to my aid because I was trying to find in his face some answering emotions, some leaping light of hope, of joy. But all I could see were cold, dead eyes staring out from me from a face devoid and lacking in colour or feeling. Surely, he must know now! Surely, he must have realized what I was trying to tell him, the message I was trying to convey! But the smooth dark blankness of his passionless eyes was all I could comprehend.

In response, all I could do was remember to breathe as he held me like that for several more seconds, sure that I would fall if he ever let me go. He dropped my chin, and turning, walked back towards his desk, his eyes looking up at mine from under black brows in an impersonal speculative way as he lighted a cigarette.

I followed him back to his desk, my hands twisting as I stood before him.

"You are wrong," I began again, mumbling, trying to find words to express my love, my tears falling down my shirtfront. "I knew I had to see you, today, tonight, when I knew, I ran every step of the way here to tell you. Oh, darling, I-"

He stood silently, watching me.

He looked at me heavily, "I don't want to hear anymore."

"But you don't know what it is I wanted to tell you, what I was going to say to you!"

"My dear, it's written plainly on your face, and there's no use in talking about it," he hesitated, then moved closer once more, and gave me that same callous, composed look from earlier and I thought to myself, he really does want nothing to do with me ever again.

I drew a sharp, surprised breath and pulled away as if by incredible force of will. Of course, he had read me so easily. Why hadn't I considered that? He knows me so well, of course he knows what I'm thinking every moment of the day, and he's not making any allowances for it. He's a master at such things. Heretofore, I had resented it, but now, after the first shock of my own transparency, all I desired was relief.

I raised my arms to his face and gently, waveringly stroked it, before my body unwittingly collapsed to the ground before him. All I could was clutch his clothing in despair, as I pleaded with him hysterically, my hands raised in supplication, my head turned back so far I thought it might break, his expression, meanwhile, one of wooden distaste as I protested, hugging his knees, before rising to my feet as I ran my hands along his breast, thinking hazily that perhaps I could seduce him to make him love me.

He unwillingly put his arms around me as I rose to my feet still sobbing and rebelling, my entire frame a medley of wails. He closed his eyes in disgust as I continued my assault, putting his hands on my own and turning his face from me in revulsion, his brow contracting into a scowl.

'I have to leave," he stated amidst my cries for mercy.

My hysteria mounted and I was shaking him violently, my face a few inches from his own.

"But not so fast!" I wailed, "Not so fast! Don't leave me!" I put my hands once more on his face to stroke it once more, my head lying upon his shoulder, when he pushed me away with so much force that I was battered into the corner, my arms reaching out instinctively to nestle my yet unborn child.

I crouched there for a split second, my blood rushing to my brain, trying to make logical sense of what had just happened.

And everything that followed felt as if it was being performed underwater.

I grabbed the loaded shotgun off f the wall in one swift movement, and before he had time to register what I was doing, I took aim and shot him, once, twice, at point-blank range in the chest. Terrified that I might not kill him and he might still be left alive, I shot him again for good measure, propelling an arc of blood and tissue behind him. As the adrenalin kicked in, I felt overtaken by that strange phenomenon of tunnel vision, when time goes into slow motion.

For a moment, his body quivered on the spot, his eyes fixated and wide, his chest cavities, ripped open by bullets, now frothing with oxygenated blood, his heart speeding up, all in a vain attempt to pump blood round his traumatized body. Then he quietly crumpled to the floor, a look of agony upon his face, his head rolling and finally slumping silently beside him.

The shot gun produced a great deal of acrid smoke and it became hard to breathe. The air was filled with a nauseating cocktail of blood and fluid. I was choking and coughing from the caustic smoke of burnt gunpowder as well as a shower of dust from the plastered ceiling caused by the reverberation of bullets. My eyes were streaming as I staggered forward gulping air, shaking and disoriented, only then did I realize what I had done.

"I've committed murder," I said to myself, as I stared at the lifeless body before me, frozen in its last death throes. "I'm a murderer now." Only then did I look upon the man I had killed, and falling to my knees, I clutched his still-warm chest to mine as if trying to revive him, when he was clearly dead, his warm blood staining my hands.

A howl of misery rose through me as I pressed his body to mine, still steaming. I screamed at the top of my lungs and urged his inanimate lips to mine. Somehow, I felt as it was my body being overtaken by coldness and deathliness, and not his which was damp and red with hot blood.

"No!" I screamed, and taking his wrist laid it against mine in anguish.

I looked desperately towards the firearm lying still beside me, and thought I'll kill myself too. That's it, and we'll both lie here, in this plush, wall-to-wall carpeted tomb forever.

I grabbed the weapon but I could not hold it against myself for long enough to pull the trigger, perhaps the barrel was jammed, perhaps it had run out of bullets, I couldn't figure out which. I looked desperately around me for another way of doing myself in- I saw a letter opener on the desk, and wondered if it might be sharp enough to plunge into my breast but then thought better of it. I could take an overdose of something- pot, pills, alcohol? I searched for options in my disoriented brain. All I could see was the shadow of pallor and death coming over the room like a dark cloud, blotting out every other thought from my brain.

Then, I thought to myself, as I looked again at that lifeless form, he deserved it, didn't he, for everything he did to me. It was only a matter of time, wasn't it? Either he would kill me or I had to do him in. That's something I had known early on, that same night on the beach. My heart hardened all of a sudden as I stared at him, mouth agape in a silent scream. He deserved it; I told myself once more, it was only a matter of time before...

My mind was delusional, my legs would barely hold my forms upward, I couldn't mouth a thing, but pure horror as I told myself "It's only your problem."

"_And played around and brought me down, and finally threw me out. I got burned, but I learned what life was all about,"_

I realized I had to dispose of his body somehow, cover up the crime, find some way to exonerate myself, release myself from this affair; there couldn't have been any witnesses I told myself- but all I could do now was stare in blank resignation at those crumpled limbs.

"_And I often think of him, every now and then, that sweet talking old Candy Man."_

My mind was clear as if washed clean by rain now, I knew somehow, what I had to do. I still couldn't help looking at him though, and somehow a small smile winked its way onto my face, as I stared at him and thought, he would have smiled too, if it had been me and not him lying here now, he'd have thought he was a clever bastard for doing me in like that before cleaning up the scene of the crime as thoroughly as a cat licks cream off its paws.

Hatred anew rushed through my veins as I approached him and closed his eyelids, turning his face over in a strange act of empathy, all the while smiling like the happy little murderess I was, warmth renewing its flow to my extremities. I loved him, I told myself, but what he did to me, now that was inexcusable…

"_He had it coming, he had it coming, he only had himself to blame,"_

'_If you had been there, if you had heard it, I bet you would have done the same!"_

"_He had it coming, he had it coming,"_

"_He took a flower in its prime, and then he used it, and he abused it- it was a murder, but not a crime!"_

"_He had it coming, he had it coming,"_

"_He had it coming along- I didn't do it, but if I'd done it, how could you tell me that I was wrong?"_


End file.
